Can we get personal? I mean, I feel like we are at that point in our relationship. I’ve been doing this thing for 21 days. My period started today. As I was thinking about what to paint, I immediately thought of my Diva Cup. Listen, that thing makes me so happy! Since we have already established that we are getting personal, let me tell you, I’ve had a heavy period ever since I’ve had periods. I get horrible cramps, and it’s just a generally miserable experience for me. I’ve been seeing an acupuncturist to help alleviate my symptoms. He says that your aren’t supposed to vomit a week before you start, or have 10 day periods, and that you aren’t supposed to feel like a faucet. So there, now we are REALLY getting personal. Besides getting treatment, which has meant no more throwing up for me! Yay!
The one other major change I’ve implemented in the last couple of years has been to start using a menstrual cup called the Diva Cup. There are a bunch of brands out there and people as always have their own brand preference. I’ve only ever used the Diva Cup, in fact I’ve only ever just used the one Diva Cup I bought years ago. It’s still going like a champ, and shows no sign of stopping.
Prior to using a menstrual cup, I was always stuck thinking about it when I was on my period. I’m sure that you’ve heard of Toxic Shock Syndrome (but if not, check out the link there). Well, so had I and as a person with a touch of the neurotic, I was always paranoid about it when using tampons. Plus I would leak ALL THE TIME. It was horrible.
Then I met the Diva Cup. It wasn’t the easiest thing to get the hang of, but once I did, it was incredible! Because it’s a cup with a large capacity, I am free to go about my day and not worry about if I’m going to spill over. This was life changing for me. You just empty it when you go to the bathroom, and away you go! It’s been amazing and it definitely makes me a happier person.
This isn’t the first time I’ve written about the Diva Cup! I originally wrote and published this piece in May 2012 over at On The Rag Mag:
Avert yer eyes if you don’t like reading about lady parts or menses.Avert yer eyes if you don’t like reading about lady parts or menses.
If I were mini-Oprah and I had a talk show and I was able to tell the entire world about just one of my favorite things, I would tell the world about the divacup.
If I could buy the world something, it wouldn’t be a coke, no sir. I would happily stand on a hilltop like the folks in that there video and stand next to my multicultural sisters and wave a silicone menses catcher in the air. Oh, yes I would.
Over at Jezebel they have an article about the diva cup. It’s an okay read, but I am just so over people and their attitudes about menstruation! I am so over WOMEN and their attitudes about menstruation, especially. The comments on the website, and on Jezebel’s feed on facebook are just infuriating to me.
That someone is so grossed out by their own body just says so much about our cultural attitudes about women and their bodies. Isn’t it fascinating that someone would seriously cringe at the thought of touching their own menstrual blood, that according to pop culture and the advertising industry MOST women would balk at touching their own vagina during their period; Yet at the same time, we as women are not supposed to bat a curled and mascaraed eyelash at the thought of swallowing something that comes from the sexual reproduction organ of the opposite sex. I just can’t get over the fact that someone would be hideously grossed out by touching their own excretion but not tasting and ingesting the excretion from another person entirely!! I’m not saying that all ladies love oral sex, or women who don’t like getting their hands messy are crazy, I just think it’s a really interesting thought process that makes one culturally accepted and the other not.